Colbert 'run' risks breaking law

Hopefully there’s a good campaign finance lawyer out there in Colbert Nation, because its leader could be headed for a showdown with the Federal Election Commission.

Comedy Central star Stephen Colbert may have been joking this week when he announced he’s running for president. But his declaration and subsequent celebration of his candidacy — heavy on the affected bloviation that has made him a pop culture phenomenon — are raising some potentially serious legal issues.

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If he continues moving toward a presidential campaign, particularly if he, or Comedy Central, keeps spending money exploring and promoting by hyping it on his nightly half-hour news parody show, he could get himself and his network in trouble for violating election laws, including those barring corporate campaign contributions.

“You don’t get a different set of rules because you’re running as a joke,” said Marc Elias, a leading Washington election lawyer who represents Democratic candidates.

“You may get a different set of rules because it’s a joke and you’re not really running,” said Elias, who stressed he was not speaking for any client. “But if it isn’t a joke, then there may be any number of issues.”

With Colbert, it’s tough to tell, since his whole shtick is faux-serious.

His “candidacy” could be just a stunt to sell his recently released book. Or it could be more: He has people on the ground in his native state of South Carolina helping get him on the ballot.

On his Wednesday show, he signed papers to get on both the Democratic and Republican primary ballots there. And on his Thursday show, he unveiled a campaign website and even made it clear a top election law firm, Wiley Rein, had advised him on how to avoid running afoul of the prohibition on corporate campaign contributions.

Still, he highlighted only a paragraph in the memo from the firm that could have been part of the gag; it skirted the heart of the issue, and instead addressed whether Doritos could sponsor his campaign. Answer: No, but Doritos money could be used to sponsor his coverage of his campaign, just not the campaign itself.

Don’t look for a straight explanation from Colbert, though, since he rarely departs from the character he portrays on “The Colbert Report” — a blowhard right-wing talk show host named … Stephen Colbert, who apparently is patterned after Fox News’ Bill O’Reilly.

And that Stephen Colbert seems quite serious about running for president.

Two and a half weeks ago, a Comedy Central employee called the South Carolina Democratic Party to ask about the requirements for getting on the state’s January primary ballot, according to Joe Werner, the party’s executive director.

You need to pay a $2,500 fee, or collect signatures from 3,000 registered South Carolina voters on a petition, then get the blessing of the party’s executive committee, Werner told the employee.

“It didn’t seem very serious — we were kind of joking about it on the phone,” said Werner, who called himself “a huge fan” of Colbert’s. But then Colbert’s representatives called back more recently requesting the paperwork — and did the same with the state’s Republican Party.

On his show Tuesday, Colbert made it official — or at least as official as it gets on his show.

“Nation,” he told his audience, as he is wont to call it, “I shall seek the office of the president of the United States.” He blew kisses, stood from behind his anchor desk and bowed, as red, white and blue balloons fell from the studio rafters and the words “I’m doing it!” flashed on the screen.

On the next night’s show, he signed the paperwork, but only after announcing he was crossing out part of an oath pledging not to “knowingly violate any election law.”

He also said he was posting a downloadable copy of the Democratic Party’s petition on his website and urged South Carolina voters to sign it. But on Thursday’s show, he said his lawyers advised him he couldn’t use his show’s site to campaign, so he posted the petition on the new campaign site.